October 2005Bearskin to Holly Fork: Stories from Appalachia
by Bob Sloan

As Bob Sloan sees it, All writers are only responding to the age-old plea, Tell me a story. In Bearskin to Holly Fork, his debut collection, Sloan responds with a group of diverse tales that meet all the tests of successful short stories: They engage the readers interest, vividly portray characters to care about, and start and end self-contained plots in a matter of a few pages each. His detailed stories deal head-on with the sadness, hardship, and social ills that are all too real in contemporary Appalachia. Yet even the unpleasant situations are sometimes tinged with humor. From The Procedure, in which a man makes a covert trip to Lexington with a younger woman, to the unsettling Troops, with its population of unwelcome visitors, Sloans stories are surprising, thought-provoking, forthright, and true to the region and the people he loves.